Video of differently-abled Ranchi singer goes viral

Nature compensated Jharkhand’s Tumpa Kumari, 16, who was robbed of her vision, with an unmatchable mellifluous voice.

Such is the power of her singing that barely two days after her video was uploaded on social networking sites, Facebook and Youtube casually by a group of management graduate trainees, records have started tumbling.

Till last count at 6:30pm on Monday, Tumpa had fetched 2,250,348 views, 100,161 likes and 118,647 shares on Facebook. The figures were increasing with each passing minute. Besides, she has also garnered 2,157 shares on YouTube.

Tumpa’s exploits do not end here. Mesmerised by her singing, people from across the globe and titans from Bollywood’s music industry have come forward to adopt her, hone her skills and groom her into a playback singer.

Veteran music director Ravindra Jain has offered Tumpa to come to him and he would help her get her “rightful” place in the industry. Reputed playback singers Shreya Ghoshal and Ankit Tiwari have also offered to help Tumpa in all possible ways.

A person from Haryana has pledged to help her get her vision through cornea transplantation.

Tumpa is excited by the unsolicited attention she has been getting over the last two days after her video went viral on social media sites, but she remains unfazed. “I am happy to get appreciation from big singing stars and music directors. If they wish, I would certainly like to meet them,” she says with a youthful smile writ large on her face.

For this orphan, who studies in Ranchi-based Brajkishore Residential Blind School, life was confined to the school campus in the company of 13 other blind girls.

She knows only one person outside this school, her elder sister who is married and settled in Odisha. She does not want anyone to delve in her past life and hence declines to answer queries related to her parents, family, near and dear ones.

Tumpa sings almost all the Bollywood numbers she remembers with perfection. However, the Ashiqui 2 song Sun Raha Hun Main original sung by Ankit Tiwary and Shreya Ghoshal is her favourite.

Says the school principal, Neelu Verma, Tumpa is originally from Dhanbad. Her elder sister got her admitted to the residential school after learning that children with visual impairment are taken care of free of cost here.

“We rehabilitate our children either by teaching computer education or singing. The day she came to us, we found Tumpa to be a gifted singer. We will be happy if the Bollywood music industry comes forward to help her hone her skills,” Verma said.